


The Escritoire

by DictionaryWrites



Series: Obedience and Instruction [3]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-17
Updated: 2015-04-17
Packaged: 2018-03-23 10:32:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3764863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DictionaryWrites/pseuds/DictionaryWrites
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Short ficlet; Harry and Lucius go shopping for furniture.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Escritoire

Lucius doesn’t follow Harry into the little antique shop, initially, hovering in the doorway. He is plainly and obviously reluctant, lips twisted into an expression of barely concealed disgust as he looks around the curiosities on the outer shelves.

         “We needn’t buy-”

                                “It’s just furniture, Lucius,   
                    it’s exactly the same as the stuff you’d buy in Diagon Alley.”

Lucius scowls, but Harry’s expression remains plainly amused, a quirk to his lips as he steps back and towards the old shop’s door.

        “I’ll just buy without your opinion if you don’t come in…”

Lucius’ silver brow furrows, and Harry has won.

He looks too _tall_  to be in the antique shop, too tall and too regal and too ARISTOCRATIC - it’s a Muggle shop but it’s not particularly high class, and every shelf is packed with pretty little ornaments and pieces of jewellery.

             “All the furniture,”

   Lucius complains quietly and subtly into the shorter man’s ear,

                            “will be lacking in the necessary ench-”

Harry loudly clears his throat, offering a small glance to the proprietor and elbowing Lucius in the embroidered cravat.  

        “Shut up.   
              Never heard of DIY?”

                                                                           “No.”

       “It means “Do-It-Yourself”.”

Lucius huffs, and he walks into one little aisle to examine the scarves and framed postcards hanging from the papered wall; it’s truly bizarre, to look through furniture that does not move or shift or offer polite greeting, but not all of it is as low class and ugly as he might expect.

Lucius’ eyes flick to the (curiously unvocal) mirror to the side, and he watches as Potter laughs with the proprietor, a short old man with no hair and thick-lensed spectacles; the Muggle points Lucius to a series of vinyl records and, behind them, a bizarre machine Lucius guesses is some sort of miniaturized gramophone.

He turns away, and he continues to step along the carpeted floor, glancing over the bustling shelves, overfilled as they are with dozens of small  baubles. He sees some ornaments, and hanging from a hook a bright pink and white stuffed cat, and Lucius stares at it, head tilting.

A kneazle?

           “It’s a Bagpuss, Lucius.  
                      Case for a hot water bottle.”

  comes Harry’s explanation from behind him, and Lucius hears the immediate explanation to the proprietor that Harry’s partner is French, and did not grow up in the UK. Lucius manages to restrain the need to sulk at the false explanation.

He picks it up, nonetheless, somewhat interested by its bright colouring.

He stops short, then, and his expression is no longer subtly BORED.

                                                                 “Harry.”

It’s not an imperative, but Harry walks across the shop anyway, and he stands beside Lucius, regarding it with interested: it’s a beautiful thing, carved of mahogany and with neat filigree around each of the drawers and the carved legs of the table. It is astonishingly beautiful, positively breathtaking, and Lucius WANTS it, even though he has only recently condemned the store about them.

                      “It’s a desk.”

                                                                “It is an escritoire.”

                      “Right.”

Lucius resists the urge to roll his eyes, because such things are undignified motions to perform in public, but he will make it up later; Potter sounds, as he often does when regarding things of importance, ridiculously underwhelmed.

           “You want it, then?”

                                                                      “Yes.”

              “Do I need to say it?”

                                                                “You need not.”

                  “I’m going to.”

                                                        “I thought that would be the case.”

             “I told you so.”

                                                                           “Shut up.”


End file.
